


every good love story starts with a simple "hello"

by plastromeme



Category: gen:LOCK (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Canon Compliant, Canonical Character Death, M/M, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, mostly at least, yeah.... this is the hill i've chosen to die on
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-23
Updated: 2019-03-23
Packaged: 2019-11-28 15:36:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,353
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18210221
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/plastromeme/pseuds/plastromeme
Summary: When it gets too muchWhisper my name to the windsAnd my soul will find yours…(Esha Jamal)





	every good love story starts with a simple "hello"

As he reads across the gen:LOCK briefing, Leon absentmindedly rubs the guard on his forearm. The hologram is hardly a confidential one, containing just names and pictures, but he’s holed up alone in his shared room, studying features and putting the face to the name that is scrawled below. 

 

Kazu Iida… Cameron MacCloud… Valentina Romanyszyn, and…

 

Like the others, he studies the picture first, which helps him remember the name easier. Clean shaven, a blond short quiff, brown eyes… Leon can remember any face he’s seen, and though he knows he’s never seen this man before, something about him seems awfully familiar. 

 

His eyes trail down to the name at the bottom, and his heart beats deeply.  _ Oh _ , he thinks to himself, looking at the name he’s looked at for nearly all his life. 

 

_ Robert Sinclair _ burns underneath his guard. 

 

\---

 

The strange phenomenon that is  _ soulmates _ has been around for centuries. One’s soulmate is their other half, or other part if someone has more than one. To find one’s soulmate is no easy task, and the only guide is a word or phrase that is significant to the soulmate, written somewhere across the body. 

 

For Leon August, his words are on his left forearm, a name written in messy writing. He’s a part of the lucky few where, instead of a phrase or image, he has his soulmate’s name on it. 

 

And soon? He’s going to be meeting his soulmate. 

 

\---

 

Leon isn’t there to greet the gen:LOCK initiative, and doesn’t even  _ see _ any of them until later that night. He manages to introduce himself and exchange some pleasantries, but the doc wants the initiative to eat together and get to know each other, so they cut it short. 

 

It’s nearly two weeks before he can work up the courage to talk to Robert “call me Rob” Sinclair again, which is absolutely awful, by the way. He’s well old enough that he shouldn’t be getting the fear he had back in high school, but he can’t help that or the warmth in his chest and cheeks when he sees Rob. He’s not like Jodie, who flirts with anything that moves (much to Miranda’s teasings), and he’s not like Chase, who (before the accident, at least) manages to attract all sorts of attention. 

 

He corners Rob in the lunch before their first upload, and waits until the others are out of the immediate hearing range before speaking to him. “Rob, you want to have lunch with me?” he asks. 

 

Rob looks at him with almost confusion lighting up his features. “You and your friends?” 

 

“No, just me,” Leon clarifies. He keeps his face in a friendly neutral expression, even though he can hear his heartbeat in his ears. 

 

“Alright,” the other says, grinning slyly. 

 

They talk more than eat during their lunch break, hidden away in one of the few unused rooms at Anvil. It’s just as Leon reaches over to take the other’s hand that Rob checks the clock, and the two hurriedly finish what they can of their lunches, already ten minutes late. 

 

\---

 

He hears about how Rob wasn’t actually Rob. He doesn’t want to talk about it. 

 

(He does.)

 

He reaches the lab just in time to see Rob get into a pod. He hears the screams and sees the blood. It’s not until later that Jodie mentions off handedly about who Rob was that Leon starts to feel relief that it wasn’t the real Rob.

 

(It doesn’t help the heartache that even though he  _ knows _ it was most likely all an act, this is the Rob he spent so much time mulling over and  _ just _ had lunch with. The same Rob who mentioned in a quiet voice that he wanted to do something _ good _ in his life.)

 

He tries not to think about it. He doesn’t wake up in the mornings in a cold sweat. 

 

(He does.  _ He does _ .)

 

\---

 

Life goes on, as it does. Things stay the same, things change, people  _ die _ . 

 

Leon ponders on this only a few seconds before he’s uploaded. 

 

\---

 

As he powers down from the holon, Leon feels the absent name burning bright hot, a faraway cry for help. He surges towards the burning as his vision floods white.

 

Anticlimactically, he wakes up in the pod he’d uploaded from. He had expected a little more…  _ trouble _ waking up, with the doctor’s earlier spiel about him being  _ almost _ compatible, but everything seems fine. 

 

His arm is still burning like crazy, so he ignores the others trying to check up on him and takes the guard off.  _ Robert Sinclair _ glows a dull red. He turns it to the side to look at it better, and the glowing increases. 

 

“He’s  _ alive _ ?” Miranda speaks for him. 

 

He swallows the lump in his throat, mind flashing to the bloodied mess the undercover Union agent ended up being. “He’s alive,” he says. 

 

\---

 

After his miniature breakdown, Robert Sinclair easily joins back into the Union patrol formation. He rubs his right fingers against his palm, feeling the triangle lacking in heat. When the patrol turns onto the next street, his marking feels colder, and he can’t help but fear that something’s happened to his soulmate. 

 

The feeling persists throughout the next couple weeks as he’s transferred to patrols closer and closer to the border. Sometimes the mark would be as cold as ice, the skin around in numb and grey. Most times, it’s just barely colder than the rest of his skin, providing coolness in the heat of the Union uniforms. 

 

The city he’s patrolling on is right on the border, and thankfully, it’s attacked by the Polity. As his fellow guardsmen rush into battle, he hides in a nearby house, gathering his wits. He sheds his Union armour like a second skin, loads his gun, and rushes back out onto the battlefield. 

 

His patrol group is still fighting as he steps out onto the street, so he grabs some cover from a car and picks them off neatly, before they have a chance to figure out what’s happened. He hears something behind him and turns around to see a  _ massive _ robot.  _ A Holon _ , he thinks to himself, remembering the talks from the patrols men. 

 

The bunny-like holon tilted her head, before nearly jumping up and down with joy. “Guys, I found ‘im,” she says, excitedly. “I found Sinclair.” He watches as she listens to something else and then kneels before him. “Listen, I’ve got to go back and fight, but there should be an evac crew ‘eadin’ this direction, yeah?” 

 

Robert, kind of overwhelmed that this is  _ actually _ happening, just nods dumbly. He spent a long time after escaping in just an endless state of paranoia, and never once stopped feeling anxious about getting to the border. Now that he’s really here? He doesn’t know what to, now. 

 

The holon skates away. Robert goes back to the car for cover, just in case something goes wrong (which is usually the case with him). It’s not long before heavy footsteps round a street and start coming towards him. 

 

“Robert Sinclair?” One of the soldiers ask, and he once again nods. “If you’ll come with us.” 

 

It’s not long until he’s escorted onto a ship, and the hologram of Colonel Marin appears before him. While, after a few questions at least, she determines he’s the real Robert, she tells him that he’ll be a lockdown until they can perform some tests. 

 

As he looks out the window of the rapidly disappearing city, he figures yeah, that’s fine with him. 

 

\---

 

It thankfully only takes a few days for Robert to be cleared. As soon as he exits his holding room, he’s met with a rather dashing man that just…  _ feels _ familiar. 

 

“Hello,” the man says, and Robert finds his eyes wandering to black ink on the guy’s forearm. 

 

_ Robert Sinclair _ sits there in a bold font. He turns his hand over, the triangle on his palm matching this man’s suit. 

 

“Hello,” Robert replies. “Lunch?” 

 

An almost haunted look flashes in the other’s eyes, before it clears up and he grins. “Lunch,” he agrees. 

**Author's Note:**

> i know i mentioned in a comment that i wouldn't write more but damn if i haven't fallen in love with this pair. hope you enjoyed reading!


End file.
